UUSB LIBRARY ' H, Jleto Pebforb jf it tp gears! Recollection* bt> iflaub i^enba 1914 THK I-MM ENDS' MEETING HOUSE. CHAPTER I. my grandmother's quiet sitting room hung a picture entitled ''New Bedford Fifty Years ago," which held my childish fancy. Now, after another half-century there appears on the walls of my memory another picture bearing the same title. Last year a New York paper gave much space to a controversy as to whether Jonathan Bourne, the ex-Senator from Oregon, (one of the boys playing marbles in my picture) was called Jack or Johnny in his youth. A woman added her say, with cruel sarcasm, asserting that he was plain Johnny, and mighty plain at that. But she called up delightful reminiscences of the drives around the Point Road, up to the Head of the River and back across Fairhaven bridge. Of the Fourth of July celebrations on the Com- mon, and the afternoon and evening circus on Pope's Island. Of the delights of Arnold's Gar- den; of Polly Johnson's candy shop on Seventh street, with its toothsome ginger cookies, sticks of candy and spruce gum. Of picnics on the rocks at Fort Phoenix, and in the grove at My ricks, all of which are seen in my own picture. There are some quaint characters on its streets. Old Daddy Bowman with his tin-pail of sticks of 6 XFAV BEDFORD FIFTY YEARS AGO home-made molasses candy. He quite upset the gravity of a religious meeting by arising, and in all seriousness reciting: "The boys the treacherous ice did trust, First it cracked and then it bust." Billy White (who was very black) and his pig, familiar figures, who also gained prominence in Sunday School circles, when the little girl who was asked if she had ever seen a shepherd with his sheep, replied promptly: "Oh, yes, she saw one every day, Billy White and his pig!" Simple Jimmie Dyer, the wood-sawyer, of whom a housekeeper told this story. She had employed him for the day, and after giving him his dinner, she was obliged to go out, so left his supper for him. He ate it immediately on her departure, and went home, declaring he never yet had worked after supper. Adelaide Goodale was another curious char- acter, who sometimes wore a hat and a bonnet at the same time, the former perched on top. She had the most nasal of twangs, and kept a thread and needle store and a few "sweeties" on Third street. One winter the doctor advised her to take cod liver oil, but she told him that she fried her cakes in candle grease and stood over the smoke, and guessed that was just as good and a deal cheaper. Ni:\V BEDFORD FIFTY YEARS AGO 7 CHAPTER II. chief of winter sports in the New Bed- ford of fifty years ago was the coasting down Bush street hill, enlivened by the cry of of "horse comin," at the cross streets. The finest sleds belonged to Captain Seabury and Henry Howland, the young colored man whom we children called the "contraband," altho' we had no notion of its meaning. I was a girl of nine, when in the fall of 1868 the election contest between Grant and Coif ax against Seymour and Blair took place. In Republican New Bedford I soon became a stanch convert to that faith, altho' my New York father was a Democrat, a detested "copperhead." This fact I never acknowledged to my playmates as it would have meant social ostracism. After the election New Bedford went wild with joy, and the city was ablaze with excitement, torch light processions, and illuminated houses, candles being displayed in each sash pane of the windows, and I was allowed to sit up until half- past nine o 'clock ! So enthusiastic was I over "our" victor}' that I wrote an exulting letter to my "dear defeated Dad" illuminating its pages with pictures of the torches and the windows of the houses, most effectively touched up with splashes of red and yellow crayon. I even called him (on paper) a "D. 0. D." without conception that the polite political phrase meant a "darned old Democrat." Our summer pleasure we took at Fort Phoenix. From the days of barefooted frolic in the water, 8 NEW BEDFORD FIFTY YEA'.iS Add to the "spooning" on the moonlit rocks, we have loved thee, dear old Fort Phoenix! Our names are among the hieroglyphics on the beacon, and many gorgeous sunsets have we viewed from that point of rocks ! Often did we yearn for the delight of paddling in the water there, when we were not the possessors of the necessary "toll" over the ferry or across the bridge. But by removing our shoes and stockings we could stealthily wade back of the toll-house, reappearing on the bridge at a safe distance beyond, and continue blithely on our way. The large rocks in the meadows on Allen street made another delightful playground, and a short cut was over the tipping, slippery plank laid across the mill pond at Bedford street. The mill stream ran heavy and high during the spring and autumn rains, and although our elders advised the longer and safer route by the streets, yet with the obstinacy observed in the children of 50 years ago, we persisted in crossing the dangerous mill pond. Never since has it rained as hard as in those "line gales" when the mighty elms "against a stormy sky, their giant branches tossed," and the streets ran like rivers. With rubber boots and water proof cloaks, lined with red, the hoods fastened closely around our chubby faces, we beat our way to the wharves, and on the rafts back of the old fish markets, where * 'breaking waves dashed high," we sought and found adventure, with a thrill akin to that felt by Mayflower an- cestors, and our grandfather whalers. NEW BEDFORD FIFTY YEAftS AGO Peaceful Arnold's Garden, the antithesis of roaring storm and breaking wave, claimed for us a fascination with the odd grotto of twisted trees, lined with shells, taken from caverns of many a deep sea. The brilliant flower beds, and box bor- dered walks, the peach trees trained to grow on flat trellises, the old oak tree at the entrance, surrounded by " Arnold's Bank'' a mound which we told each other in awesome whipsers covered the bones of dead Indians. On the lawn was held the yearly festival of Charles White's dancing class, a band of fairies who glided hither and thither and escorted their queen in her chariot. Many of these fairies are now sedate and stately grandmothers with no suggestion of fairy-like grace and pose. The handsome fairy-queen Alice Warwick Slo- cum, afterward became a preacher in the Friends ' Society with her mother Phebe Akin Slocum. Each summer the Friends First Day School held its outing in Rachel Rowland's grove on the Point road. Why did we never call it Matthew Rowland's! The rich cadence of her voice as she prayed in meetings I can hear now, and the sanctified teachings of Annie Wood, Susan How- land, Sarah Holmes and Susan Taber are still remembered. Tell me is New Bedford now honored with any such dear saintly old ladies! 10 XK\V BEDFORD FIFTY YEAKS AGO CHAPTER III. FTER the garrulous fashion of middle- aged and elderly people, who have ob- tained a listener, I shall " begin at the beginning," which with me was the sew- ing-society (afterward called the Barclay) held at the Abraham H. Howland house on County street in the winter of 1863. His daughter, Alice, sweet-faced and gentle, was our teacher in the Friends' First Day School, and tiny tots though we were, most industriously did our wee fingers pick the lint for the wounds of the soldiers in the hospitals at the south. In Widow Gerrish's Private School on Seventh street, between Bush and Walnut streets, at four years of age, with my little sewing-bag of patch- work-pieces and a primer, I became a pupil, and on stormy days the ebony, motherly arms of Betsey Blackburn (then our cook) carried me thither. Does anyone now remember Betsey? Some things else we learned in that quaint little school besides spelling and patchwork! The little boy in the next seat smuggled me a note carefully printed on blue paper and folded in many creases that the tender mes- sage might not escape. "Beautiful Maud, Wilt thou be mine?" I was not "beautiful," being tow-haired and freckled, and that adjective has never since been applied to me the fifty ensuing years, which per- haps is one reason I have cherished that tiny slip of paper. NEW BEDFORD FIFTY YEARS AGO 11 The next May, the little lover hung me a May- basket, and eating through its sweets I found two pennies wrapped in paper. A later inquiry brought this solution : His mother had given him ten cents and after buying all the basket would hold he had conscientiously put in the change. Often have I wondered if this strict sense of hon- esty continues through his life. From Mrs. Gerrish's we advance to the Bush Street School, where Miss Maria Bailey (with curls the envy of us all) and Miss Mary Allen, held kindly sway. Here we were initiated into the mystery and delicacy of the combination of spruce gum with rubber "chewed in." After the ingredients were well mixed, it was considered a token of good-will to pass around bits to our chosen chums. And this without a thought of the myriad of germs, microbes and bacilli standing on their horrified hind legs! Happy pre-microbic age! When we attained William Street School we added to this the diet of pickled limes and two- cent pickles from the Union Store, wrapped in coarse brown paper that soon became a part of the juicy fruit itself, and was swallowed with it ! Here we were under the sterner rule of Miss Savery, and who remembers her peculiar pun- ishment for whisperers! She would summon the culprit before her, and order him to face the school. Then from her position on the raised platform, she would tip back his head and slap his lips with her fingers. Of course, it didn't hurt, but the humiliation broke up the habit among the boys, but the girls whispered on to the end ! 12 NEW BEDFORD FIFTY YEARS AGO Miss Savery inspired her scholars with a zeal for knowledge, and the inspiration to make the most of one's opportunity for learning. As a re- sult of this let me add as a personal experience that in a year of her training I achieved more than in two years of New York schooling. Particularly did she require of us a clear distinct tone in read- ing, and a thorough knowledge of history and mathematics. Our wits, seeking a diversion, were led to the making of rhymes, coupling the names of boys and girls that sounded well together, whether any sentiment existed or not. Like this: "All the animals marched into the Ark, George Brownell to Hester Clark." These couplets were scribbled on the ever present board fences, that "all might read who ran." Yielding one day to the poetic fever I coupled Miss Savery 's name with that of the handsomest man on the school board, and in the blackest of graphite inscribed my tribute on a newly-painted fence. So vain was I of my poetic effusion that I repeated it as our family sat down to supper. Swift and sudden was my descent from the Delect- able Mountain of Conceit to the Slough of Des- pond. In that unaccountable view taken by our elders, of actions especially "cute" as we see them, I was sent forth in all haste, armed with a wet cloth and a bar of yellow soap to cleanse off every letter, and supperless went I to bed. The yard of the Friends' Meeting House, Spring and Seventh streets, was especially attrac- tive to a certain crowd of the William street NEW BEDFORD FIFTY YEAKS AGO 13 scholars, but this was a forbidden playground and therefore the most desirable! Added to the fun of scaling the high fence and dropping off, was the excitement of constant expectancy of being ''chased out." Let us stroll thro' Seventh street from the "Cherry Lane" end. First is the house of Capt. John A. Macomber, on the Bush street corner, known for its hospitality. Capt. Merrill's house on the next corner was to my childish imagination the castle which held the ogre of fairy-land tales. Trying one day to reach a fragrant rose which grew close to the fence, he suddenly appeared and in a voice of thunder (like old ogres) and in lan- guage unheard before by my horrified ears, threatened dire punishment. For a year there- after I crept by on the other side of the street. Sweet-faced Susan Howland lived in her widow- hood, and Caleb Kempton and his wife Lovey, on the other two corners of Walnut street. Set far back from the street was the quaint house of Phebe Mendall. Does the name suggest memories of sponge cake "light as ocean foam/' of sym- metrical little pound cakes, with a dome of the whitest frosting, and luscious fruit-cake incased in walls of snowy sweetness? In dainty lace cap and kerchief, using the plain language of the Friends, she lived her quiet simple life. Sixth in direct descent from John Cooke and Sarah War- ren, whose fathers Francis Cooke and Richard Warren were all of "Mayflower"' fame, she was authority on all questions of genealogy, and in many a household the puzzling controversy was settled by "Ask Phebe Mendall, she knows!" 14 NEW BEDFORD FIFTY YEARS AGO Capt. Dan'l Wood, then the prim Congdon sis- ters lived next, and opposite the Slocums, and on the corner of School street, Capt. Luce, especially favored by heaven because his house was of brick ! The Widow West, the Thorntons and the Macys lived on the east side, and on the west, Polly John- son hobbled about her little candy shop exchang- ing the children's pennies for Jackson-balls and John Brown's bullets. At the Union street end, Dr. Abbe lived before he moved to the fine house on County street built by Sylvanus Thomas. He looked down this vista of over-hanging elms which shaded the "Annals of a Quiet Neighborhood." SKVKXTIf ST HEIST. "Time is a tide that ebbs in vain, Whose warnings, love and life defy; Space, but a curtain rent in twain By the strong hand of memory ; While we in thought can tread again The pleasant paths of days gone by. ' ' PART TWO. "SUMMERS OF AULD LANG SYNE." CHAPTER I. n be "born and reared" in New Bedford was to my childish fancy the acme of all human happiness. It was my greatest affliction, that unfortunate fate which made New York my birthplace instead of New Bedford. There are some misfortunes in life we can live down, and after forty years that does not seem an insurmountable barrier to happiness ! But in 1870, when at eleven years of age it was decided that school-days in New Bedford were at an end, and I was to return to my home and the schools of New York, no greater calamity could I conceive. My woe was somewhat assuaged with the promise that all my summer vacations should be spent in New Bedford, and for more than ten years the pledge was kept. That first year in New York as the time drew near to close school, the days, even the hours were counted before we should set sail for the Promised Land. On the Friday afternoon that ended the term, father took us over to the Fall River boat, my sister and self, and entrusted us to the care of the captain, whom we knew. We were immensely 16 NEW BEDFORD FIFTY YEARS AGO proud of traveling alone, and regarded our two diminutive selves as the most important person- ages on the steamer, and when a white-haired, benevolent looking old gentleman, with head slightly to one side and a twinkle in his eye (Mr. James B. Congdon) inquired ''Are these little ladies traveling all alone?" our pride was at its height. Tucked away on the tiny shelves of our state- room, we could scarcely sleep for the happiness that we were approaching with every turn of the paddle-wheel, and the groaning and creaking of the machinery was music to us. Hurriedly we dressed and without breakfast in the morning we boarded the dingy Old Colony railroad train- but there our hurry ended, as everybody knows, familiar with the slow travel of that road. Side- tracked at Taunton, switched off at Myricks, we finally steamed in to the grimy Egyptian struc- ture, the North Depot. ''Bishop's Bedroom'' was our choice of hacks, although in later years when the vanity of young ladyhood was manifest, we transferred our alle- giance to the more stylish conveyance driven by Charlie Fleetwood. But "Bishop's Bedroom'' was our first love and our trunk was hoisted on the rack with a thud that sent us bouncing from the leather cushions. The excitement of that early morning ride thro ' those quiet beloved streets ! We tried to be lady- like and demure, but the sight of a familiar face would bring two eager faces and four wildly swinging arms out of the hack window. It was too early for many of our young contemporaries NEW BEDFORD FIFTY YEARS AGO 17 to be abroad; but we saw Billy White with his ridiculous high hat and wheel-barrow of swill, the modern ''garbage" was then unknown, perhaps Asa Dyer, the "Admiral of the Clam Digging Fleet," on his way for a day's fishing, or Martha Billings simpering along, or Abner Davis with rake and hoe, a talkative soul who knew every- thing and everybody and always called President Grant, "United States Grant"; or slow going Seth Booth on his deliberate daily rounds deliver- ing milk (we often wondered how he ever finished one day in time to begin the next), or a store- keeper unlocking his shop, as we rattled and bounced over the cobbles of Purchase street, and glad were we to turn off on the smooth roadway of Union street. After an excitable breakfast we rushed over to apprise our aunts and cousins of our joyous ar- rival, and then we must go down street to the store folks at Richmond's bakery and to the Union Store to shake hands with Mr. Bliss and Mr. Brownell and "Shube" Smith. We were so immensely elated over our arrival in town, that we were greatly chagrined if we did not meet a corresponding enthusiasm. Down to Hawes' Ice Cream Saloon on Purchase street and then to be received by Mr. Hutchinson's bland and benign smile. We were omnivorous readers, our thirst for knowledge was second only to that for ice cream, so Mr. Hutchinson was certain of a small but steady revenue during our stay. This recalls that our books 'were always in need of exchange Saturday evenings, the only excuse which ever gained for us permission to go down-street after 18 NEW BEDFORD FIFTY YEARS AGO supper, and oddly enough there always appeared at the same time a group of boys from the south end of the city, on the same laudable errand ! That first Saturday afternoon we must explore the meadows on Allen street for the brook, and the familiar rocks where we played house, the pantry of which was stocked with Mother Jenks ' doughnuts and ginger-cookies, from across the way. The stone walls on Hawthorn and Allen streets were to be walked on, for to do this the next day, the Sabbath, would have been desecra- tion. We were allowed "freedom of worship'' in ac- cord with the religious liberty preached by our ancestral Pilgrim Fathers, and imbibed the doc- trines of Friends, Trinitarians, Methodists and Unitarians. Even the views of the Seven Day Baptists and Second Adventists were assimilated. In the morning of the First Day we attended the Friends' Meeting, and had we known then the power of mental telegraphy, our thought waves would have been centered on Josiah Holmes whom we watched so closely to "break up" the meeting. But after that we were free to attend any de- nomination, and our choice was the Trinitarian Church, for the young and handsome Mr. Julien was the new attraction in the ministerial field- especially for the young folks. The Methodist Episcopal Sunday School under Fred Washburn's superintendency was always in- viting, and it was in the Methodist school that the little girl recited this humorous verse. She was a little tot and had been taken by an older brother to his own class of boys. The boys had been asked NEW BEDFORD FIFTY YEARS AGO 19 by the teacher each to recite a verse of scripture, and then she turned with an indulgent smile to the little girl and asked if she had one to say. ' ' Oh yes," was the quick response: "Monkey, monkey, bottle of beer, How many monkeys have we here One, two, three, four, five," pointing a tiny finger at each laughing boy. This little girl had been attentively studying the cata- logue of library books, when asked what book she wanted, replied that she would take "The Cat on the Log." Sensational topics for sermons were used even then, in those good old days, to "draw"; this subject was advertised by a Methodist minister ' ' Pious lassitude and cowardice, plus a blind hug- ging of a mossy past.'' Vesper services at the Unitarian Church claimed the attendance of the young people, and a decorous promenade down County street to our homes was the only worldly indulgence of the day. 20 NEW BEDFORD FIFTY YEARS A CO CHAPTER II. SOME OF THE HOMES VISITED. OWN on South Water street facing the bay, where an unobstructed view of the harbor and incoming ships could be seen from the windows, was a yellow house with green blinds built by Uncle Peleg. He was a sea captain and had a great-coat, buff in color with large bone buttons, which he wore for many, many winters. To the expostulation of his chil- dren on its antiquated appearance he answered that he had observed that once in every seven years his great-coat was the top of the style and that was enough to suit him! His saintly wife survived him many years, twelve of which were spent in total blindness, relieved only by the faithful ministrations of a loving daughter. Look- ing into those sightless eyes and patient face we children learned a lesson which is remembered in these later years when the temptation comes to complain over trivial causes. Another quiet home of suffering was that of Captain John Akin, whose wife, Lucy Akin, though a cripple for years, even at the age of eighty retained her bright vivacious manner and girlish laugh which were charms to attract us young folks as frequent visitors, and an added attraction was the savory saucer-pies of pumpkin and mince. John Akin in his younger days had been captain of a packet running from New York to New Bedford and was afterward pilot. In the days of their prosperity, they built the large NEW BEDFORD FIFTY YEARS AGO 21 house, corner Bush (now Madison) and Seventh streets, afterwards purchased by Captain John A. Macomber and later by Mr. Harrington. But when poverty and sickness and old age, that tragic trio, surrounded them, their strength of character and Christian fortitude shone forth clearly. Miss Betsey Winslow's home on County street was always an attractive place with its fernery and aquarium, and she made the children so wel- come that I fear we rather imposed on her gener- ous hospitality. Precious gifts we bore from there of tiny white snails, but these had a fashion of losing themselves before our happiness as their possessors had existed a day. A place where we found a cordial welcome awaiting young people, was that of gentle Nathan Reed. He was a fine conversationalist. His mind was stored with knowledge of the events in the world around him, and with recollections of his own boyhood days in New Bedford when he gath- ered huckleberries in the meadows just west of old Third street, the largest and finest to be found anywhere. He loved to tell of his coming to New Bedford with his father on the memorable "Dark Day" of which the "Old Farmers' Almanack" bears record. When the stars were visible, and the birds after awakening, returned to their nests. He was one of "Nature's noblemen'' with a con- scientious conviction of duty to his country and home, and his children were proud of their in- heritance. There was a peppery spinster on whom we called from a sense of duty only, for she always met us with the salutation; "Well, you've really 22 NEW BEDFORD FIFTY YEARS AGO come at last!" or "I s'posed you'd forgotten all about me ! ' ' with the energetic reminder to ' ' wipe our shoes clean and not litter up the place." An odd ornament hung on the wall of her little par- lor, and its history explains the peculiarity of this queer person. At the marriage of a friend, when the wedding-cake boxes were distributed to the guests, grim fate decreed that the end piece of the loaf with a corner of the frosting broken off, should fall to her share. As all the feminine world knows, wedding-cake boxes after being tied with their witching bows of ribbon are all iden- tical, but the wisdom of Solomon, and the logic of Portia combined, could not have made this ob- stinate lady believe that a slight was not intended. So she had a deep frame made to fit this piece of cake, and under its glass covering it was pre- served for years to show how she had been slight- ed at So and So's wedding. The place we loved most to visit was at the dear old lady's, in a peaceful little sitting-room, with the prim, cool, caned-seated chairs set stiffly against the walls, the carpet of ingrain in subdued brown shades, the polished half -circular mahog- any table on which stood boxes of richest Chinese lacquered ware, tortoise shell ornaments, and curious flowers made from daintily colored sea- shells, and kept from the dust under a glass globe, all brought home by her sailor son. It was always the coolest room! The August sunshine only flickered through the dark green Venetian blinds, and its tempered rays touched the painting of a small boy leaning over the edge of a pier, pulling a tiny girl in a pink dress from the water. Yes, XKW BEDFORD FIFTY YEARS AGO 23 that was her Johnnie rescuing his little sister Mary from the bay at Naushon, and in the row- boat near by could be seen the red apples she had reached out to grasp. It was easy to lead the conversation to her only son John, for she dearly loved to talk of him. The tragedy had come to her, so common to wives in those early days of whaling, when to have a sea- man's chest carried out of the house for its three years' cruise, was a sorrow almost as harrowing as if it had been a coffin. Her two brothers and husband had been drowned, and now in an agony of fear that her one boy would want to "follow the sea,'' she sent him at twelve years of age (1840) to a boarding-school at Long Plain kept by Ira Leland, a Baptist minister, with the request tli at he should have a sharp watch on John, for she feared he would run away to sea. And run away he did, the call of the ocean ever sounded in his ears ; the lure of the sea ran in his veins. His mother learned that John was seen on the docks and had arranged to ship with the cruel- est captain that sailed out of the port of New Bedford. Pleadingly she persuaded him against this, but only with the promise that he should sail with the first captain known to her as kindly in his treatment of the cabin boy. So John shipped as a sailor at thirteen years of age. The official document necessary at that time and called the "Protection of American Seamen" reads that h6 was four feet eleven inches in height! Such a tiny fellow to ship for a three years' voyage of hardship and peril! Such a wee little "American seaman!" 24 NEW BEDFORD FIFTY YEARS AGO To follow the further fortunes of John, finds him at twenty, first mate of a whaler; then for five years he was digging gold in California with the "forty-niners.'' He was captain of the mer- chant vessel "John Jaj T> ' plying its trade be- tween New York and China, until the Civil War, when he served his country as acting ensign in the navy, until peace was assured, when he settled down to merchant life in the citv of New York. ALICIA WAI; WICK SLCMT.M ("APT. JOHN AKIX AND HIS AY IKK. l.l'CV AKIN. XKW BEDFORD FIFTY YEARS AGO 2") CHAPTER III. FREE BIDES. HE slogan of our vacation fun was "Free Rides ! ' ' No mode of conveyance was despised with the one exception of the charcoal man's. After forty years I can hear his raucous call, C-h-a-r-c-o-a-l ! That he was in league with the "Evil One" we had no doubt, with his sooty grin and eyes of fiendish glitter through the grime! Then, too, the mysterious cabalistic characters he made on the back of the wood-house door fully proved his alliance with the under world. Charcoal could then be bought for six or eight cents a basket and the tally kept on the wood-house door was like this : >KI Yes, there was one other vehicle for which we had no use. The soapfat wagon of Zenas Whitte- more! Our great delight was the low hung oil truck that we could sit on almost as easily as in a chair at home, or so we thought, until the sad day when we missed our calculation and sat splash- ingly in a deep puddle. Mr. Allen, a good natured driver for the "Tucker and Cunmaings'' Farm, would stow us in among the boxes and baskets in his delivery wagon, and drive us a whole morning about his route. Seth Booth, that typical Yankee, well-read, a good talker, shrewd at a bargain, with overalls tucked into his boot tops, twinkling black 26 NEW BEDFORD FIFTY YEARS AGO eyes, and iron-grey hair, had the shabbiest of an- cient carryalls to take him and his berries, and eggs and milk, to and from his bachelor apart- ments far out on Allen street. But we never disdained a proffered ride, nor with Zelostes Almy, either, who lived on the Horse Neck Road between Akins Corner and South Westport ; and a weary trudge it would have been returning therefrom but for the kindly ' ; up-lif ts ' ' of city-bound farmers who tucked us in with other 11 garden sass." My earliest childish impression of Zelostes Almy was that he belonged to a gang of pirates because he wore gold ear-rings in his ears! How I wronged the kindly old soul, who followed the peaceful pursuit of serving us with the sweetest pats of butter with a sheaf of wheat stamped thereon, and the snowiest 'of pot-cheese and fresh eggs. Never did we learn the name of the kind hearted cheery old pilot of the ferry boat crossing between New Bedford and Fairhaven, but his good nature allowed us to squeeze into the pilot house, and many a placid summer afternoon did we spend plying back and forth on the calm Acushnet, " scot-free." But not so with the stage ride to the Head of the River! With Mr. Hersom, the stage driver with the fine tenor voice with which he regaled the tedium of the way, it was "No pay, no ride." So we denied ourselves sweet German chocolate and lemon sugar, cream cakes from Richmond's and pickled limes and John Brown's bullets to pay for that delightful outing. The schools were closed, but a coterie of the William Street scholars met dailv for a frolic in NEW BEDFORD FIFTY YEARS AGO 27 the yard of the Friends ' Meeting- House on Spring and Seventh streets. The stalls for the horses made a fine hiding place in "hide and seek," and the nicknames of a quartet of our school boy friends figured in this form of "counting out": "Blue eyes, sweet mouth, Stumpy, Buck, U T. Spells out goes she ! ' ' Never will I reveal the real names of those he- roes. One is a lawyer in your town, another a doctor of some renown, all are prosperous and (also) pudgy! There were excursions to watch the sunrise from old Fort Phoenix when we crawled from our beds at four in the morning, and sunset suppers on the great rocks there, or down at the "Cove" on the Point Road. There were basket parties, the girls supplying toothsome goodies, which the boys cheerfully carried in market baskets. Where now would you find a youth brave enough to carry a basket on his arm through the. streets of Fair- haven OD a summer afternoon! But those days were before Mr. Rogers had boomed the little town to its present attractive style; then it was a prim and prosaic village, whose grass-grown streets were deserted during the warm August afternoons, its dwellers indulging in afternoon naps. Gay sailing and rowing parties made the river ring with songs and girlish laughter and as we drifted with the tide we listened to the rhythmic thud of the horses' feet going over the UUOD L rp r\niY t Y- {ofZ Z_ (.0 28 NEW BEDFORD FIFTY YEARS AGO old wooden bridge. That sound, wherever heard, always carries me back in spirit to dear old New Bedford. "To the good old, grand old, golden days, To the davs bevond recall!"